Tag Archives: motivational speaker

blogging internet podcast

Ear Ear – using the iPhone blind

April 12, 2010 – 12:02 am

Over on the Afloat.ie site, I’ve been trying to step things up with multimedia contributions, and yesterday marked a turning point with my podcasts taking a turn for higher quality – some nicer intro sounds, a better microphone connection, and a bit more thought going into how the sections of audio match up (click to hear).

[audio:http://expad.ie/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/AfloatYouthNats.mp3]

This links in with my experiments with the micro-blogging service posterous, I’ve been helping motivational speaker and all-round impressive bloke Mark Pollock begin to experiment with podcasting through our ongoing relationship as he prepares for the Round Ireland race. Posterous has been handy for Mark, as it enables him to update his Facebook, Twitter and Blog all in one go via a simple email without having to navigate all those sites individually, a laborious process when you’re using an audio system to ‘read’ the pages for you.

With Mark, who’s blind, podcasting also makes a lot of practical sense. Up to now, he could record audio memos on his phone, email them via posterous, and they’d be automatically posted onwards. It took a bit of tweaking to have them sit into the WordPress blog, but otherwise it’s worked fine.

Yesterday things took a step further. Mark now has an audio-enabled iPhone.

I thought he was mad abandoning a phone with tactile keys for a touchscreen with only visual references. But it works really well. Click through to read more.

read more »

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More Polar Previews

November 14, 2008 – 7:43 pm

Uploaded a few podcasts from my interview with Mark Pollock (pictured), who went blind ten years ago, and started a career as an adventurer/professional speaker, taking on some of the world’s most incredible challenges.

He’s run the North Pole marathon, the Everest Base Camp Marathon, and plenty more besides, including New Zealand’s gruelling Coast-to-Coast race. But being blind, his appreciation of the mountaintop is slightly different from yours or mine. In the first podcast here, he talks about what’s going through his mind when others are taking in the view from the top.

[audio:http://expad.ie/audio/Pollock2.mp3|titles=Blind Perspective]

His next challenge is the Amundsen Omega 3 South Pole Race – more than a month of sub-zero slog to the south pole, the first time since the original race people have taken on each other, as well as the elements, en route to the pole. In podcast two, Mark opens up about the question of what it’s going to be like, and whether or not he can actually finish the race, and become the first blind person to do so.

[audio:http://expad.ie/audio/Pollock4.mp3|titles=Is It Possible?]

And to wrap it up, he gives us a brief description of what it is that drives him to do the things he does. Enjoy!

[audio:http://expad.ie/audio/Pollock3.mp3|titles=Possibility of failure]

Mark’s website, where you can buy space on his South Pole flag.

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journalism Uncategorized

Pollocks to the Rules

November 13, 2008 – 9:17 pm

Over the Christmas season, while most of us are munching turkey and passing the cranners, Mark Pollock will be preparing for a race to the South Pole. It’s the first time it’s been done since Amundsen and Scott raced there in the early 1900s – the race which made Ernest Shackleton famous.

Pollock is retracing Shackletons’ steps – but he’s at a slight disadvantage, being totally blind, but believe it or not has done this sort of thing before, running marathons at Everest Base Camp and in the Arctic.

I wrote about Mark Pollock’s entry to this race in August (here) and below is a brief snippet of the interview in which he describes racing against, then meeting the world’s greatest living explorer, Ranulph Fiennes, who unloaded a few harsh truths on him during an interview after the North Pole marathon. Ice Cold.

Check out his website, where you can get your face on the flag he plans to plant at the pole.

[audio:http://expad.ie/audio/Pollock1.mp3|titles=Ran Says 'Go Home']

More from Mark’s interview in the next few days.

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